The following abbreviations are herewith defined:
3GPP third generation partnership project
CSI channel state information
DM diversity multiplexing
DVB-H digital video broadcast for handheld devices
eNB evolved node B (of an LTE system)
E-UTRAN evolved UTRAN
i.i.d independent and identically distributed
LTE long term evolution of 3GPP
MI mutual information
Node B base station or similar network access node
UE user equipment (e.g., mobile equipment/station)
UMTS universal mobile telecommunications system
UWB ultra wideband
UTRAN UMTS terrestrial radio access network
WiMAX world interoperability for microwave access
Wireless relay networks are the environment of this invention, such as for example WiMAX, E-UTRAN (also known as 3.9G), UWB systems and DVB-H. Wireless relaying is assumed to offer benefits such as easy and fast network deployment, low cost of installation and maintenance, flexibility, and scalability in both size and density. Coverage probability increases exponentially with the number of relay nodes in the network. Additionally, the use of multiple relays for a single message increases diversity in the signal.
Relevant treatment in the prior art similar to the system model described herein, J. Nicholas Laneman and Gregory W. Wornell [DISTRIBUTED SPACE-TIME-CODED PROTOCOLS FOR EXPLOITING COOPERATIVE DIVERSITY IN WIRELESS NETWORKS; IEEE Transactions on Information Theory, vol. 49, no. 10, pp. 2415-2425, October 2003] propose space-time coded cooperative diversity protocols achieving full spatial diversity gain (i.e., the diversity order equals the number of relay terminals). Further, Y. Jing and B. Hassibi [DISTRIBUTED SPACE-TIME CODING IN WIRELESS RELAY NETWORKS; IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communication, vol. 5, no. 12, pp 3524-2536, December 2006] analyze distributed linear dispersion space-time coding schemes and show that a diversity order equal to the number of relay terminals can be achieved. In a work by Kambiz Azarian, Hesham el Gamal and Philip Schniter [ON THE ACHIEVABLE DIVERSITY-MULTIPLEXING TRADEOFF IN HALF-DUPLEX COOPERATIVE CHANNELS; IEEE Transactions on Information Theory, vol. 51, no. 12, pp. 4152-4172, December 2005], the presence of a direct link between source and destination is assumed, and it is shown that an extension (to the multi-relay case) previously introduced in R. U. Nabar, H. Bolcskei, and F. W. Kneubuhler [FADING RELAY CHANNELS: PERFORMANCE LIMITS AND SPACE-TIME SIGNAL DESIGN; IEEE J. Selected Areas of Communication, vol. 22 no. 6, pp 1099-1109, August 2004] is diversity-multiplexing (DM) tradeoff optimal.